Shanti A. Parikh, PhD

Shanti A. Parikh, PhD

Chair and Professor, African and African American Studies; Professor, Anthropology, School of Arts & Sciences

Professor Parikh has spent over 20 years researching, consulting, advocating, and teaching courses on issues related to gender, sexual and reproductive health, inequalities, policy implementation, and community health, with particular focus on sub-Saharan Africa, African American communities, and the Caribbean.

Her projects have included HIV/AIDS, youth sexuality, marital HIV risk, masculinity, sexual minorities (sex workers and LGBTQI), and women’s reproductive health. As a medical anthropologist, she uses community-based ethnographic and historical research methods to examine how interventions into health, wellness, and notions of “compliant patients” are refracted through local hierarchies and realities.

Professor Parikh is particularly interested in resource poor regions, including Uganda, among African Americans in the U.S. and the Caribbean. Her research has been funded by the National Institutes for Health, Fulbright, and the Leadership Council. Her service has included serving as Board Chair of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region and Southwest Missouri, Vice Chair of St. Louis Effort for AIDS, Investment Chair for the Deaconess Foundation, and Board Member of Public Radio.